Nine Ways To Save Serious Money On Car Repairs

Are you looking for the tips & tricks to keep repair costs down for your vehicle? No worries! Here, in this article, I’m going to list some smart moves to save serious money on car repairs.

A car is the 2nd largest purchase that the consumers make, after a home. But, it’s a fact that costs never stop, when you own the vehicle. As per the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the 2nd largest household expense is to own and operate a vehicle, which is approximately $8,800/year.

1. Know The Car’s History

The first way to save money on serious car repairs is to ensure you buy a good car. Be extra careful while buying pre-owned vehicles. If the vehicle is 10 or more years old, the repair and maintenance costs usually add up to higher than the worth of the car itself. First of all, you need to make sure that the car you have is safe to drive. For this, it’s crucial to know the history of the car and what all it has been through in the past years.

Advertising

Just ask the seller to show up the receipts regarding repairs, maintenance, and services. If he does not have any receipts, then you should seriously reconsider your options! You may also ask about the car’s extended warranties and personalized registrations. Last but not the least, do ask about the police reports. If the car went through some serious accidents, there must be a police report to escort it.

2. Check The Odometer Before Buying

When you are considering buying a used car, you must check the odometer for sure. Obviously, it’s always a good thing to have the car with the less mileage. You can find the cars with the less odometer reading, especially from the old folks, as they drive less, and you will get a more reliable vehicle. If you buy a five year old car that has run more than 60,000 Kms, then you’ll surely get in trouble as such cars ask for more maintenance costs.

3. Clean Interiors

While you are checking out the car’s interiors before the purchase, check out the button controls and other such functions as well, to ensure they all work fine. Check out the seat cover for tears and stains as you may end up spending more on these later.

Advertising

If you are the seller, try to keep the interior clear of stains, smells and the other things as these may lead to car devaluation. Try to put seat covers on to keep the actual ones clean and safe. And when you plan to sell the car, just take them off before the buyers arrive.

4. Don’t Just Rely on the Carfax

Many consumers rely on Carfax reports which reveal the history of the car. Most of the car dealers and owners offer a carfax; however, this does not mean it’s accurate. In fact, most of the studies show that most vehicles have been in some kind of accident, however small, and these reports may don’t include the damage done. So, be aware and don’t just rely on it, as this could mean extra costs for you later on. Have the car checked thoroughly by a professional car mechanic, if needed.

5. Maintain The Exterior

Once you have bought the car, you certainly have to avoid scratches and dents. Always drive carefully.

Advertising

You also need to check the garage or the ground where the car is parked to inspect the oil pools, which will indicate any problem in the car engine or the transmission. Overlooking small details will cost you a lump sum of money on repairing and also, it will devalue your car from the actual market value.

6. Rotate Your Tires

Just keep it in mind, as compared to the rear tires, front tires wear out more quickly. By replacing them from time to time, you can make sure that all tires wear out in an even way and that you won’t have to replace them ahead of time. This will eventually save your time, money and of course the hassles you face all along.

7. Replace Your Air Filter

It’s very crucial to keep your car’s air filter clean. It will clean the engine and this eventually improves the fuel economy. Try to replace it every 28,000 miles or so. For the exact timetable, you can check your owner’s manual. Replacing air filter is quite an easy job to do, which will curtail overall maintenance cost. You just need 5 minutes and there you go! If you don’t know how to do it; you can learn it by viewing YouTube videos as well.

Advertising

8. Handle Other Easy Repairs

Handling of other easy repairs such as replacing wiper blades, lights and fuses by yourself, will help you cut down overall fixing costs. It’s very easy to deal with these little things. If you have a busy schedule, just plan ahead to do it on the weekends. You can also watch how-to-do videos for more information on your car problems.

9. Changing the Oil

Usually, mechanics tell that you have to change the oil every 3000 miles, but this criteria is only for used cars. When it comes to the new cars, they contain synthetic oils that can easily cover more than 10000 miles before requiring change. Don’t forget to see the manual card and keep an eye on the exact oil date change.

Whether you are young or old, always try to use these simple tricks which not only ensure you buy a reliable and safe vehicle, but also saves you maintenance money in the long run.

Why Do I Have Bad Luck? 2 Simple Things to Change Your Destiny

Are you one of those people who are always suffering setbacks? Does little ever seem to go right for you? Do you sometimes feel that the universe is out to get you? Do you wonder:

Why do I have bad luck? Is bad luck real?

A couple of months ago, I met up with an old friend of mine who I hadn’t seen since last year. Over lunch, we talked about all kinds of things, including our careers, relationships and hobbies.

My friend told me his job had become dull and uninteresting to him, and despite applying for promotion – he’d been turned down. His personal life wasn’t great either, as he told me that he’d recently separated from his long-term girlfriend.

When I asked him why things had seemingly gone wrong at home and work, he paused for a moment, and then replied:

“I’m having a run of bad luck.”

I was surprised by his response as I’d never thought of him as someone who thought that luck controlled his life. He always appeared to be someone who knew what he wanted – and went after it with gusto.

He told me he did believe in bad luck because of everything happened to me.

Advertising

It was at this point, that I shared my opinion on luck and destiny:

While chance events certainly occur, they are purely random in nature. In other words, good luck and bad luck don’t exist in the way that people believe. And more importantly, even if random negative events do come along, our perspective and reaction can turn them into positive things.

Your luck is no worse—and no better—than anyone else’s. It just feels that way. Better still, there are two simple things you can do which will reverse your feelings of being unlucky and change your luck.

1. Stop believing that what happens in life is out of your control.

Stop believing that what happens in your life is down to the vagaries of luck, destiny, supernatural forces, malevolent other people, or anything else outside yourself.

Psychologists call this “external locus of control.” It’s a kind of fatalism, where people believe that they can do little or nothing personally to change their lives.

Because of this, they either merely hope for the best, focus on trying to change their luck by various kinds of superstition, or submit passively to whatever comes—while complaining that it doesn’t match their hopes.

Most successful people take the opposite view. They have “internal locus of control.” They believe that what happens in their life is nearly all down to them; and that even when chance events occur, what is important is not the event itself, but how you respond to it.

This makes them pro-active, engaged, ready to try new things, and keen to find the means to change whatever in their lives they don’t like.

Advertising

They aren’t fatalistic and they don’t blame bad luck for what isn’t right in their world. They look for a way to make things better.

Are they luckier than the others? Of course not.

Luck is random—that’s what chance means—so they are just as likely to suffer setbacks as anyone else.

What’s different is their response. When things go wrong, they quickly look for ways to put them right. They don’t whine, pity themselves, or complain about “bad luck.” They try to learn from what happened to avoid or correct it next time and get on with living their life as best they can. They have this Motivation Engine, which most people lack, to keep them going.

No one is habitually luckier or unluckier than anyone else. It may seem so, over the short term (Random events often come in groups, just as random numbers often lie close together for several instances—which is why gamblers tend to see patterns where none exist).

When you take a longer perspective, random chance is just . . . random. Yet those who feel that they are less lucky, typically pay far more attention to short-term instances of bad luck, convincing themselves of the correctness of their belief.

Your locus of control isn’t genetic. You learned it somehow. If it isn’t working for you, change it.

2. Remember that whatever you pay attention to grows in your mind.

If you focus on what’s going wrong in your life—especially if you see it as “bad luck” you can do nothing about—it will seem blacker and more malevolent.

Advertising

In a short time, you’ll become so convinced that everything is against you that you’ll notice more and more instances where this appears to be true. As a result, you will drown yourself in negative energy and almost certainly stop trying, convinced that nothing you can do will improve your prospects.

Not long ago, a reader (I’ll call her Kelly) has shared with me about how frustrated she felt and how unlucky she was. Kelly’s an aspiring entrepreneur. She had been trying to find investors to invest in her project. It hadn’t been going well as she was always rejected by the potential investors. And at her most stressful time, her boyfriend broke up with her. And the day after her breakup, she missed an important opportunity to meet an interested investor. She was about to give up because she felt that she’d not be lucky enough to build her business successfully.

It definitely wasn’t an easy time for her. She was stressful and tired. But it wasn’t bad luck that was playing the role.

Fatalism feeds on itself until people become passive “victims” of life’s blows. The “losers” in life are those who are convinced they will fail before they start anything; sure that their “bad luck” will ruin any prospects of success.

They rarely notice that the true reasons for their failure are ignorance, laziness, lack of skill, lack of forethought, or just plain foolishness—all of which they could do something to correct, if only they would stop blaming other people or “bad luck” for their personal deficiencies.

I explained to Kelly that to improve her fortune and have “good luck”, first decide that what happens is nearly always down to her; then try to focus on what works and what turns out well, not the bad stuff.

Then Kelly tried to review her current situation objectively. She realized that she only needed a short break for herself — from work and her just broken-up relationship. She really needed some time to clear up her mind before moving on with her work and life. When she got her emotions settled down from her heartbreak, she started to work on improving her business’ selling points and looked for new investors that are more suitable.

Advertising

A few months later, she told me that she finally found two investors who were really interested in her project and would like to work with her to grow the business. I was really glad that she could take back control of her destiny and achieved what she wanted.

Your “fate” really does depend on the choices that you make. When random events happen, as they always will, do you choose to try to turn them to your advantage or just complain about them?

What’s Next?

Now that you’ve learned the 2 simple things you can do to take control of your fate and create your own luck. But this isn’t it! These simple techniques you’ve learned here are just part of the essential 7 Cornerstone Skills — a skillset that will give you the power to create permanent solutions to big problems in life — any problem in any area of your life!

If you think you’re “suffering from bad luck”, you can really change things up and start life over with these 7 Cornerstone Skills. It may even be a lot easier than you thought: